Green Island Serenade
by Kuruk
Summary: Dawn learns to face her demons, and is reassured when she realizes that she won't have to do it alone. — Dawn/Lucas/Barry


_Notes: Written for kitsuneasika over on DW/LJ as part of the __pokeprompts Holiday Exchange 2012. This is the first I've ever written about Dawn, so please forgive the long-winded exposition of headcanon. Special thanks to the inimitable Sonata and Nonakani for their encouragement, help, and proofreading. You two are the best. Happy new year, and I hope you enjoy reading this piece!_

_Characters: Dawn, Lucas, Cynthia, Barry._

_Universe: Games — Platinum Version_

_Warnings: depiction of PTSD._

_Disclaimer: __I do not own _Pokémon_, nor do I stand to profit from this story in any form. All mistakes are my own._

* * *

**_Green Island_ Serenade**

Beyond the bridge she crossed to reach it, there are no roads on this island. In their place, there is only a path paved with shells. It winds into the distance, a bleached trail against the lurid greens of the island's landscape. She lingers beneath the bridge's awning, cupping a hand above the plastic frame of her new sunglasses to shade her eyes. They're cheaply made, crafted with enough garish charm to earn an exorbitant price tag at the Resort Area's souvenir shop—which, incidentally, is where she bought them.

"Are these lenses polarized?" she had asked the teenager working the register.

The reply was a disinterested shrug of the shoulders and a muttered, _Probably_ that, while not very reassuring, was enough to make her reach into her duffel bag and press a couple of folded bills onto the glass counter. She lifted the sunglasses to her eyes before he had finished ringing her up, her gaze on the storefront window and the passerby outside.

Presently, the midday sun beats down relentlessly on her face, the humidity clinging to her like an unwelcome second skin. Tropical weather is uncharacteristic for Sinnoh, where most days are chilly and overcast. Dawn is unaccustomed to it, and a film of sweat has settled on the back of her neck, beaded along her hairline, begun to pool under her arms.

She thinks this is what suffocating must feel like, and her body trembles with the shiver that spreads along the length of her spine.

Still, it's no use lingering here. It will be a long walk, and the earlier she sets out, the sooner she'll be able to slip inside and take a cool shower. The prospect of shedding her uncomfortably damp clothes is enough to make her take the first step onto the path. Brittle shells crack underfoot, others sifting noisily with each step.

This place is supposed to be a personal retreat for the Sinnoh League Champion, but Dawn had learned of it by reviewing some of the League's old fiscal reports. Upkeep of the grounds had fallen to the wayside when budget cuts became a necessity a few years back, and the island itself reflects that. The grass is wild and overgrown, and several of the palm trees' shed fronds litter the path. There is the trilling of kricketot and ninjask from the brush, the cawing of wingull as they swoop into the surf.

It's too much, is what she thinks.

Oh, there's no doubt about how beautiful it is from an objective standpoint, but nearly everything about this place strikes her as excessive. The colors are glaringly bright, even from behind the opaque lenses of the sunglasses. Finer details blur themselves together like a photograph ruined by overexposure, and she feels a nascent throb settle just above the bridge of her nose. The sickly sweet stench of brine has begun to make her feel slightly ill too, her stomach lurching in protest at the overabundance of it all. She doesn't want to be here; would rather be back on Lily of the Valley Island, where her office has no windows to let the smell of the ocean in, and only her collection of tasteful, ergonomic lamps lights the room. Simple, clean. Professional.

Everything this place isn't.

Dawn inhales through her teeth, exhales slowly; the air makes a low hissing noise as it passes her lips. She can understand why the League cut the maintenance budget for this place, is what she means. She probably would have too, if she had been Champion back then.

By the time she manages to traverse the shell-strewn path, her blouse has stuck unpleasantly to her skin. She is in the middle of an impassioned mental indictment of Cynthia for insisting she "take a break" and come here in the first place when she finally sees the squared roof of villa in the distance. That train of thought comes to a grinding halt, and the crack of her flats against the path comes quicker. Nearly staccato.

The wrought iron gate swings open haltingly when she pushes at it, its hinges screeching from disuse. Dawn hurries over to the shelter of the porch, her footfalls dull and muted against the brick path.

Neglect has changed the villa. Ivy climbs along its walls, the fading white paint chipped in places and covered by an accumulation of dirt everywhere else. The flower box underneath the windowsill is overgrown, clovers spilling over the edges to hang just above the ground. Idly, she traces one of the leafs. She finds that she likes the place better than she did in the pictures the League had on file, where it had been a monument to postmodern elegance. The years have worn it down and smoothed its stark angles, and Dawn feels herself relax—if only a little.

She brushes her bangs back from her forehead. Her hair is hot to the touch, warmed by the sun, and her fingers come back wet. She grimaces, reaching into her coat pocket and fishing out the key to the place.

Sunlight pours in from behind her when the door swings open, and her shadow stretches out across the floor. She hovers in the doorway, reluctant to disturb the stillness. Swallowing the lump in her throat, she steps past the threshold. The door is left ajar behind her, and she keeps close to the walls, groping the dusty surface with searching fingers. She finds the light switch after a seemingly interminable moment and, sighing in relief, flicks it on.

Nothing happens.

Her breath hitches. She flicks the switch off and then on again.

Still nothing.

She closes her eyes tightly, tries to breathe. Her fingers tighten on the wall for support as dizziness sets in, and she carefully maneuvers her way back to the door, tripping over her own feet once she's back out in the muggy air. She gasps. Body hunched, hands on her bare knees, she stares at the dirt-stained grout unseeingly as she breathes.

It takes a long, protracted moment for coherent thought to return, and—_ah_, Cynthia did mention that it might take awhile to get the electricity turned back on. Three o'clock at the latest, she had told her.

Shakily, she pulls back the left sleeve of her coat to check the time. Almost one o'clock.

_Right_, she thinks to herself. _It'll only be a couple of hours. Maybe less._

She ends up waiting outside anyway, sitting on the porch and gulping down greedy mouthfuls of air until the villa hums to life behind her.

— . . . —

The house still feels odd, even with the electricity and water running. It's not just that it has barely been lived in despite taking on the trappings of the abandoned. Things feel distinctly unresolved here. Dawn is not exactly exactly sure why, not even as she moves throughout the villa, flicking each light switch on as she goes. She finds that the house is spacious but nearly empty, devoid of personal touch. It has all the essentials: a set of tough leather furniture, covered with white sheets; a bookshelf populated by only two books, both of them about geography; a breakfast nook by shuttered windows she assumes overlook the beach; an older model refrigerator and stove, a microwave and oven.

Gradually, she begins to find the things she'll need to stay the night: cups in the kitchen cupboard, one of which she washes and fills with tap water four times before her thirst has been slaked; a bedroom with a mattress, stripped bare; two sets of clean sheets in the hall closet; and—a door over from the bedroom—a bathroom with a porcelain sink and tub.

A thick film of dust has gathered on nearly every available surface in the house, but she resolves to deal with that later. Instead, she shakes out the sheets and lays them out on the mattress and, without putting it off for another moment, heads to the bathroom to take that cool bath.

Dawn's suspicions are validated when she steps out of the bathtub and immediately gets a splinter in the side of her toe. She hisses at the sudden pain, carefully retracts her foot, and sits, gingerly, on the edge of the tub, her back to the open door.

"Great," she says aloud to no one in particular. Her voice sounds strange, smaller than she's accustomed to. To her left, the faucet drips. "Just... great."

Sighing, she gets back on her feet. Carefully, so as not to make the splinter dig in any deeper, she eases her feet back into her flats, reaches for her towel, and wraps it around herself. She keeps her hands at her side with some conscious effort, refraining from touch to avoid kicking up any dust. Undoing the good the bath had done her would just be annoying.

Back in the bedroom, she lifts her foot and removes the splinter. Quick and painless, like her mother used to say whenever she ripped off one of her bandages. She runs her tongue along the sharp edges of her teeth and grabs a poké ball out of her bag.

She tosses it into the living room, covering her eyes as the bright light illuminates the room. When it fades, Drifblim hovers in the middle of the room, regarding her with its red, beady eyes. It's a cramped fit, the white puff at the top of her head phasing through the roof.

It'll do.

Dawn offers her a weary smile as a greeting. "Bear with me a little, okay?"

The blimp-shaped pokémon moves its yellow limbs in confirmation, and Dawn nods back.

Under her companion's watchful gaze, she opens each of the villa's windows, pushing up at them until the rust gives way. Water drips onto the floor from her hair, leaving trails from window to window.

Nodding at Drifblim, she grabs and puts on her sunglasses, walks out of the house and back into the sun. It warms the back of her neck, and she realizes, belatedly, just how cold she's been since her bath. She shivers, the fine hairs on her arms standing on end as goosebumps rise all along her clammy skin.

It's a nice feeling. An almost pleasant one, even.

She stops at the gate, then shouts, "Gust!"

Plumes of dust rush out the windows. Dawn shields her eyes, watching from afar as the sea breeze picks up the dust that doesn't settle around the porch.

She clacks back into the house to survey the damage. Most of the cabinet doors are ajar. The cup she had used to drink water earlier is in pieces on the floor, and the sheets that were draped over the furniture have been blown off. One has gotten snagged on the window. It flutters in the breeze like a ghost out of one of those movies she and Barry used to watch on Halloween.

Her gaze lingers on the shattered pieces before she lifts her eyes to look at Drifblim. She smiles, but the curve of her lips is strained. "Good job," she tells Drifblim before recalling her.

After folding the sheets, she goes about closing the windows again. She can't find a broom, so she leaves the shattered pieces of the cup for later.

When she reaches the bedroom, she pauses. She can see the ocean through the bedroom window. It's blue and white as far as the eye can see, and her eyes ache at the sight.

Dawn shuts the window and clicks the lock shut.

— . . . —

When she sleeps, she dreams of Iron Island's hollow caves, the glint of a steelix's body as it skims the surface, the crisp, blue plane of Riley's broad shoulders ahead of her as he descends deeper and deeper into the hollow mines. She follows. The darkness turns murky, stale, and she can hear familiar voices ahead of her, behind her. She can't see Riley anymore. It is cold. If she listens a little harder, she can place—

Abruptly, she wakes.

Orange light filters into the bedroom, weaker than before. The sun is setting, she realizes.

Only sunset, then.

Dawn draws herself up, slips back into her flats, and walks to the kitchen. At least there is a tea kettle here, and she is sure that she saw some crumpled, dried out tea bags in one of the drawers. Not coffee, but it's better than nothing. She goes about setting the water to boil, her trembling fingers flitting from their perch between her pale elbows to the stovetop. Shaky but deft. It's habit, by now.

Her mind stumbles through the haze of delirium, so she doesn't think much. She doesn't want to. Instead, she waits. The kettle screeches for a long moment before she takes it off the flame.

The tea is bitter on her tongue, but after a few moments of sitting at the breakfast nook, sipping quietly, it's almost as if she had slept after all.

— . . . —

She finds a pack of sandpaper, an old hand sander, a roller, and an upside down can of wood finish in the attic the next morning.

It wasn't what she'd been looking for—though she's not quite sure what she was even searching for in the first place—but it's good that she did. Holding the sander in her hands makes her mind settle. The prospect of finishing the floor herself sounds good to her. Almost irresistibly so. It wouldn't be a professional finish by any means, of course, but at least she'll be able to walk around the house without her flats on.

For help, she grabs Lucario's poké ball from her bag. The aura pokémon gives her a stern, searching look when he appears. It's one that Dawn studiously avoids.

"Do you think you can help me out with the floors?" she asks him, miming her best approximation of the sanding process.

Lucario stares at her for a moment longer, then acquiesces with a severe incline of his head.

Dawn tosses him the pack of sandpaper. "Watch out for splinters," she warns.

He huffs, deftly tears open the package, and gets to work. With a sigh, Dawn grabs the palm sander and does the same.

Finishing the the floors turns out to be much more of an arduous process than she imagined. Sweat films the nape of her neck within the first few minutes, and her arms are sore with exertion. It's a repetitive process that's nothing like battling, which is a less physical but equally taxing exercise. In battle, Dawn feels unshakeable and connected to its dynamic, intimately, as if through a network of Torterra's roots.

Sanding is different, but not as dissimilar as she would have believed. The ache in her muscles makes her feel like she's liable to crumble the second she's finished, but she can spend several minutes on the same spot, pushing and pulling at the floor. Forwards and backwards, again and again. Waiting for the wood to yield to her.

It may take awhile, but each patch of wood does give in eventually, coating her hands in a fine dust. It reminds her of the earliest battles of her career, when she wore down gym leaders' stronger and more experienced pokémon with carefully planned strategies. Outlasting the vicious attacks of Roark's cranidos by turning its bullheaded charges into an advantage: keeping Turtwig close to the wall, waiting until the last possible moment to give the signal for him to jump clean over his attacker's bowed head. It was a risky maneuver that took hours to perfect, but that only made it all the more satisfying when Turtwig pivoted in midair and shot a razor leaf straight into its exposed underbelly. A critical hit, one that brought the match to an abrupt end and won her the Coal Badge.

There is no strategy involved in sanding. Almost no thought is necessary, either. The longer she does it, the more she lapses into a state of unconsciousness. With time, the hand sander seems to move on its own, and Lucario's dutiful grunts, the distant crash of waves on the beach—both seem to bleed out of her perception, as natural to her senses as the sound of her own breathing.

By the late afternoon, the living room and kitchen floors are coated in sawdust. Dawn wipes the sweat off her forehead, listening for the sounds of Lucario somewhere . He worked much faster than she could, finishing his side of the living room and moving on to the hallway before she had even finished a quarter of hers. Curious, she wanders down the hall and into the bedroom to find that Lucario has finished here as well.

She grins, weary but still filled with aching energy. "Great work," she tells him. "Ready to apply the wood finish?

Lucario cranes his neck, and the pop is audible. He nods nevertheless, following his trainer back into the living room.

— . . . —

Getting rid of the sawdust is easy enough with help from Drifblim, but applying the wood finish, it turns out, is another matter entirely.

She read the instructions printed on the can a few times before starting, but it had neglected to mention that there was no conventional way to clean it off if it got on her skin.

Dawn tries to get it off all the same.

When scrubbing her hand and forearm with hand sanitizer and sticking it under the running faucet for nearly ten minutes doesn't get the sticky substance off, desperation drives her out of the villa and onto the beach. She pulls her beach towel out from underneath her neatly folded clothes and grabs her sunglasses, plucking Torterra's poké ball from the nightstand as an afterthought. Before she goes out, she leaves Drifblim with the instruction to help dry the floor, and leaves Lucario, meditating on the kitchen counter, with her for company.

She lets Torterra out into the sand once she reaches the beach. Her oldest friend closes his eyes at the sudden burst of sunlight, then lets out an affectionate grumble at the sight of her. Dawn runs the fingertips of her clean fingertips against his head, her agitation calming slightly when Torterra closes his eyes and leans into the touch.

"I made a mess," she says levelly. "I need to clean it off in the ocean."

Torterra grumbles again in acknowledgment. Dawn pats him on the head and turns toward the sea.

Its smell is overwhelming enough to make her eyes tear up, but Dawn wades into the surf all the same. She stops when the water laps at her knees and the waves smack against her stomach, bending over slightly to dip her sticky hand in.

When she pulls it back out a few minutes later, the residue is still there.

Her frustration is like an avalanche. Her nostrils flare; her fists crash down onto the water. She very nearly _snarls_ too, but the sound catches in her throat, dies there. From the beach, Torterra calls after her, his voice rife with concern, and she takes a deep breath of the salty air through her nostrils, tastes the sea along the back of her throat, and remembers herself.

Shoulders slumped with defeat, she retreats, moving her legs, made heavy and clumsy with seawater and exhaustion, as fast as she can. She emerges from the surf stooped like an old woman, and she scuttles toward Torterra like a spurned child runs for her mother.

He welcomes her embrace with a relieved cry. Dawn simply clings to him for a long moment, collecting herself as best she can. "I'm sorry," she murmurs as soothingly as she can. "I don't know what came over me. I'm sorry."

Torterra doesn't seem convinced, and he lowers his head to ease her onto his back. Hesitant, she climbs onto the grass at the crown of his shell and sprawls out beneath the crooked tree there. The sunlight dapples onto her face, only blinding in patches. She breathes in the familiar scent of the soil here and closes her eyes.

— . . . —

She cannot see through the darkness, but she can hear them. Barry's shouted commands, Lucas's quieter ones. The sounds of a pokémon battle—no, two of them—a snide and lilting laugh. The sounds come from opposite directions. She has to choose, but she stays rooted to the spot, staring out into the nothingness. It is cold. Barry cries out, Lucas falls silent.

Around her, the darkness swells.

— . . . —

Dawn wakes with a start, jerking upright and breathing hard. Something falls asleep onto her lap, and she can't _see_—

The world reveals itself to her slowly. A scroll of oranges and reds along the horizon. The ever present smell of brine. Waves rushing along the shore, and Torterra's concerned sounds underlying it.

She's on the beach. It's sunset again.

Swallowing down the lump in her throat, she hops off Torterra's back and says, _I'm fine, I'm fine,_ until he quiets down. Her entire body aches, but she takes a couple of steps forward.

The green island teems with life and noise. It washes over her as surely as the waves, and she lets their cacophony cradle her, letting it all in to drown the roaring in her ears, the terrible tearing sound of space-time unraveling.

When she opens her eyes, her ears are still ringing. She looks upon the beach as if it were alien to her.

Traveling has severed her from her surroundings. It was hard at first, having no home but the anonymous Pokémon Center hostels and the camps she set up for herself each night. She's used to it by now, and has learned to appreciate the values the lifestyle taught her. Along the routes and towns she visited, she learned to treat her environment as if she were transient. That perception came in handy when haggling for discounts at hotels in the bigger cities, promising, _I'll be gone as soon as I defeat the gym leader—a day or two at most_. Those deals usually involved the manager's presumption that she was overconfident in her estimate. Dawn doesn't mind. It's their loss when she ends up keeping her word, after all.

Becoming Champion has always been her dream, so knowing that it would all amount to that in the end—that she drew ever closer to the Pokémon League with each step she took away from home—made things easier. She stopped craving roots a long time ago. Beyond the kind she spreads along battlefields, she no longer needs any.

On Lily of the Valley Island, she had felt like a caged luxray that paces the length and width of its confines, waiting for someone bold enough to let it out. There were regular sparring matches with her Elite Four and even Cynthia, occasionally, but most of her days and nights were consumed by stacks of paperwork and cups of coffee. Settling there, even for a couple of months, had been cumbersome. Not exactly unwelcome, just—different. Difficult to adapt to.

Here, Dawn understands what Cynthia feared. Being capable of so much, yet being deprived of the opportunity. There are no constants here. No stacks of paperwork, weekly sparring matches, or cups of coffee. Everything on the island is shifting and unsteady. The sand, the waves and how they slowly erode the cliffeside and give way to new ground. Under her guidance and her pokémons' help, even the villa is becoming something half-new.

In the end, she is the only one who is still where she has been for the past year. Caught. Stuck. In sleeplessness, in her dreams, in the isolation.

In fear.

She fidgets, and the sand shifts beneath her weight. It is fine and chalky, and the feel of it between her toes reminds her of the powdery rouge her mother would dust across her cheeks every morning, even if she didn't have plans to leave the house. On this island, she feels simultaneously small and overgrown, frivolous and misplaced. The blouses and jackets she'd packed, sensible for nearly anywhere else in Sinnoh, is completely impractical in tropical weather. Dawn loathes that feeling more than any of the others, even as she digs her toes deeper into the powdery sand, her unshielded eyes fixed on the orange horizon.

Then Torterra nudges the back of her hand gently, and she remembers.

"We can't keep going on like this, can we?" she asks him.

Even without his grumbled response, Dawn already knows what the answer is. She's known for a long time.

— . . . —

The two of them walk along the shore until her PokéGear manages to pick up a signal. She has to stand on Torterra's back to keep it, and she thumbs through her contacts and presses her finger against the familiar name before she can doubt herself.

Ever dependable, he picks up on the second ring. "Hello?" he says, and his voice sounds hesitant. Maybe it's just the static that comes with the long-distance connection.

Dawn closes her eyes and parts her lips to speak. "Hi, Lucas."

"D-Dawn," Lucas replies. He is surprised, she thinks. "Wow it's... it's been awhile."

"It has," she agrees.

The conversation lulls there, the line silent save for the crackle of the connection. Dawn's thumb hovers over the call end button, the pad of her finger brushing over it.

"How have you been?" he continues.

She opens her eyes, inhales. "I've been..." She realizes, belatedly, that she doesn't quite know how to answer that question. "I... was hoping you could do me a favor, actually."

"Yes. Of course."

Dawn finds herself laughing, albeit dryly. "I haven't even told you what it is yet."

There is a pause. "That's true." Lucas clears his throat. "Go on."

"I was hoping you could bring me a bottle of mineral spirits."

Another pause. "Mineral spirits...? Like turpentine?"

She nods, then remembers that he can't actually see her. "Yes. I got some wood finish stuck on my skin, and I can't get it off."

"Renovating your office yourself?" He was aiming for wry, she thinks. It ended up sounding a little choked instead.

"No. A villa, actually."

"A villa...?"

"It's on a small island off the coast of the Battle Area." She bites her lower lip. "I can send the coordinates to your PokéGear."

"You're not at the League?"

Mirthlessly, she snorts. "I'm on sabbatical."

"Oh. That sounds nice."

Dawn hums, noncommittal, unsure whether it is or not anymore. After a moment, she adds, "I would really appreciate it if you came, Lucas, but I'd understand if Professor Rowan has you too busy—"

"I said I would help," Lucas interrupts. "I want to help."

She closes her eyes again. "Alright."

"Alright," he repeats.

Dawn swallows down the persistent lump in her throat. "Don't break your back trying to make it here tonight. I don't need it that urgently."

Lucas chuckles. "Okay."

Silence settles over the line again, and Dawn is the one to break it this time. "I'll... see you soon, then."

"Yes," he confirms. "We'll... yes."

"Bye, Lucas."

"Good night, Dawn."

The line clicks and goes toneless, but she stays still and listens for a while longer.

— . . . —

Lucas arrives late the next morning. She must have waited by the door for an hour or two, her fingernails tapping at an uneven spot in the floor. His knock catches her in the middle of another mental debate about whether or not she should sand down the blemish, and she rises quickly despite the protests of her sore muscles.

Dawn opens the door to find Lucas bearing a box of what look like clementines in his hands, the bag of mineral spirits hanging from his wrist. Her eyes settle on Lucas's face, on the absence of pudginess that she remembered. A new geometry has taken in its place—angles that successfully toe the line between elegant and severe, the barest suggestion of bags beneath his eyes. It's only been a few months, but it suddenly feels like it's been much longer.

"You've grown," she says dumbly.

He smiles, and she realizes she has to look up a little to meet his eyes now. "So have you," Lucas says.

She steps aside to let him in, and he does so gratefully. His forehead and neck shine with sweat, and he wipes it away with the back of his hand as soon as she takes the box of clementines from him, lifting his beret and using it to fan himself a bit.

"It's hot here," he observes.

Dawn gives him a look that falls a tad short of sympathy. "You have no idea."

While Lucas fiddles around the kitchen, she goes to the bathroom to undo the blotches of wood finish on her arm. The mineral spirits have an overpowering smell, but she bears it gladly, sighing in relief when the shellac dissolves right off. She washes her hands thoroughly and sets the bottle down between the sink and toilet. Before she leaves, she catches sight of herself in the mirror—the purple bags under her eyes, how pale and gaunt her own face has become over the last few months...

She averts her gaze.

"You should have told me you didn't have any food here," Lucas chides when she walks back into the kitchen. His concern is so familiar she nearly smiles. "I would have brought you some groceries."

Dawn shrugs and leans back onto the counter, the corners of her lips still quirked upward. "No need. I'm only staying here for a couple more days."

"Still," he insists, "you should have some food around while you're here." He opens the refrigerator. "What have you been eating?"

She shrugs again, uselessly. "That can of beans." At that, she points past him and into the fridge, where an open can of _Bellsprout_ brand beans sits on the middle shelf. "I always carry a few on me whenever I travel."

"You're eating like a traveling trainer."

"That's what I am." It takes her a moment to realize her mistake. "What I _was_... you know what I mean." Her gaze flits down to her bare feet. "I don't think I'll ever be able to shake those habits off."

He shuts the refrigerator door and picks up a clementine from the box. His thumb presses into the top, tearing the skin. Then his fingers slip underneath to peel it back, deftly. Once the flesh has been exposed, he takes a piece and offers it to Dawn. "Here," he says. "You know Professor Birch loves sending these to the other professors straight from his ranch. We have a ton back at the lab."

She acquiesces, her fingers brushing against his as she reaches for it. "Thank you."

"You're welcome," Lucas replies. He keeps his gaze on her until she stops fiddling with it and pops it into her mouth. Satisfied, he smiles and sets the rest down on the counter beside her. "Good?"

"Shut up," she grumbles, picking the rest up. "Birch must have more going for these than Hoenn's climate." Suddenly aware of just how ravenous she is, she lifts another to her lips. Thank goodness they're seedless. "These are too good just to be normal, run-of-the-mill clementines..."

He laughs. "Should I have one of the aides screen them for illicit substances?"

"That would probably be a good idea, yes."

They laugh together, and the air between them seems lighter.

Lucas meets her gaze and holds it. "I've missed you," he says. "Everyone has."

She looks away. "That's... good to hear."

Noticing her discomfort, he continues, "How's the Championship treating you?"

"It's a lot of work, but I'm happy with it. Having a hand in crafting policy is incredibly rewarding, even if the Council prefers to consult Cynthia before listening to my suggestions."

"That must be frustrating."

Dawn waves it off. "It's just the way things are done. They'll start listening to what I have to say if I keep the title half as long as Cynthia did." She offers him a thin-lipped smile. "Being a skilled enough trainer to defeat the Elite Four doesn't automatically qualify you for an influential position in national politics, you know. It's prudent of them. I wouldn't take new Champions seriously either, if I were in their position."

He makes a face at her. "You even sounded like a politician just now."

"Is that so surprising?" she asks around a laugh. "You've always sounded like a professor. Even when you were eleven-years-old."

Lucas pauses, considering. Then he shakes his head. "Not really, no. Barry _has_ mentioned how you would refuse to go out and play with him while C-SPAN was broadcasting important Council meetings."

Silence insinuates itself between them, sharp and thick. It takes a moment or two, but Lucas's expression falls.

When the question comes, it is a quiet one. "Are you angry at him?"

"I was never angry at him," she says curtly, pushing herself off the counter and onto her feet. "It's not that at all."

A few seconds tick by, and she imagines Lucas's gaze on her face, his concerned scrutiny as he gauges her reactions and formulates the best possible explanations for them. They've always had that in common, the two of them. Precocious for their ages. Always thinking up a plan before they acted. In retrospect, it's probably why they became friends. It had been relieving, meeting a boy who knew where he wanted to be and did everything he could to strive for it. Charming even, when he showed up at checkpoints to bring her _appreciatory gifts from Professor Rowan_. Always closing with a _thank you for your hard work, miss_ and a proper, firm handshake. Compared to Barry's hotheadedness, Lucas was the perfect gentleman; a boy not unlike the kind that served as the centerpiece of the childhood fantasies she entertained as a little girl.

Now she only wishes he'd drop the subject.

"Then what is it?" he asks.

For the briefest of moments, she tries to find the words. They fail her in this regard, as they always have. Some things just can't be articulated; this, she knows, is one of them.

Instead, she says, "Are you planning on staying? Or do you have to get back to the lab?"

"Dawn..."

She walks toward the bedroom, speaking all the while. "If you are staying, I should go buy some food. You're right. I'd hate to subject you to a meal fit for a traveling trainer." She grabs her wallet and Togekiss's poké ball, not bothering with anything else.

"It's not that—"

"Are you staying or not?" she interrupts.

He's fidgeting, shifting his weight from foot to foot. Flustered. That's one thing that separates them, she's found—it takes Lucas longer to recover when events don't follow the outline.

The sight of his anxiety gives her something to focus on, and she decides to press her advantage with the single-mindedness of a predator.

"Well?" she presses, feeling righteous without knowing why. "Are you staying or not?"

Lucas worries his bottom lip, his gray eyes on the floor. "Do you want me to go?"

She stops; he looks up at her, pinning her in place with the sincerity of his gaze. Her focus dissipates, and she is left feeling as lost as she's been since she arrived.

"If you want me to leave," he repeats, "I'll go."

Her lips part before she realizes what she's going to say. "I want you to stay." It's barely a murmur, but it's there, hanging in the air between them. The sound of it surprises the both of them.

Lucas nods. "Okay."

She lingers by the doorway, her hand on the cool brass of the knob.

"Do you want me to go with yo—"

"I'll be fine on my own," she says before walking out the door.

— . . . —

"Hello?"

When she was eight-years-old, Dawn recorded the first female Champion's induction to the Hall of Fame on one of her mother's old VHS tapes. In the years that followed, she would rewatch the tape at least once a week, soaking in each and every detail of the ceremony: the elegant pant suit she wore to the event, the way she let her long, blonde hair flow free and unencumbered, how she enunciated each word with humility and precision. With each televised match and session of the League Council that Champion Cynthia appeared on, Dawn's admiration only grew, and grew, and grew—until her dreams became inextricable from her role model's accomplishments. _I want to be a powerful trainer like Cynthia. I want to lead sessions of the Council with her grace and poise. I want to become Champion and prove what female trainers can do, just like she did._

So she shirked her mother's old contest dresses and dedicated herself to being a trainer, a strategist, a politician. If she could only grow to be a fraction as strong and intelligent and graceful as Cynthia was, she promised herself, she would be proud of her accomplishments.

"Dawn?" Cynthia's voice is crisp over the phone. "Dawn, are you there?"

In a way, she's never stopped looking at Cynthia like some sort of heroine.

"How do you do it?" she asks.

The voice on the other line is silent for a while. "How am I able to do what?"

"Keep yourself together after what... after everything that happened." She stops, forces her voice to steady itself. "I-I just yelled at one of my best friends. I haven't seen him in months, and I _yelled_ at him. I don't even know why I did it. I just did."

Cynthia waits until she's finished to begin speaking. "Sometimes it's easier to keep those closest to us far away. The fact that you've recognized what you've done is good, Dawn. It's your first step toward changing it."

"How do you do it?" Dawn repeats.

The former Champion is silent for a long moment. "I take it one moment at a time. I talk about those memories, even when it feels like I can't. I keep my friends and loved ones close, because I need them more than I care to admit sometimes, even to myself."

Nails biting into the palm of her unoccupied hand, Dawn grits out, "I don't want to let him—that _world_... have any power over me. I don't want to be weak."

"Acknowledging that we were there doesn't make us weak, Dawn. It makes us strong; it helps us overcome them."

Dawn lets out a strangled chuckle. "Is that why you told me to take time off to visit this place?"

"I can be here for you as much as I possibly can and share my own experiences," Cynthia begins, "but you're the one who can take the first step."

"How?"

"Speak with your friend," she says simply. "Tell them about it, even if it's just a small part. Trust them to hear you out. Trust yourself be vulnerable. Let them hear you."

Dawn hangs up and stands still for one, two, three seconds. She breathes in, puts her PokéGear back into her pocket, and presses the heels of her palms against her eye sockets. They sting. Then, with a shuddering exhale, she walks across the street and into the supermarket.

— . . . —

"How long will you be staying?" the clerk asks as she swipes her purchases across the price scanner. A gallon of moo-moo milk, three bags of shredded cheese, clear plastic bags filled with fresh vegetables, a large bag of rice, an overripe pineapple, a pack of green tea.

"I don't know," Dawn replies as she pulls a few bills out of her wallet.

The clerk smiles. "Vacationing with friends?"

She smiles back. "Yes."

On her way out of the store, she sets some of the groceries down onto a bench and pulls her PokéGear back out. It has to be now, before she loses her signal again. She thumbs through the contacts, touches the one she wants. The screen goes blank as she composes a new message, attaches a map, and hits send before she can doubt herself.

She gets to her feet and takes the first step back. The first step home.

— . . . —

She finds Lucas sitting at the breakfast nook, reading _Annals of the Former World_. He doesn't seem particularly engrossed in it, because he's looking up at her as soon as she manages to get the door open.

"I brought food," she says, lifting the bags for his perusal.

Lucas nods in response. "I see that." His smile is a shy, tentative thing.

He helps her pile the groceries onto the counter and store the items that need to be refrigerated.

"This is a lot of food," he points out as he pushes the milk along the shelf to make room for the rest.

"I like being prepared," she replies, and hands him the packets of shredded cheese.

They end up stir frying some vegetables for dinner, Dawn chopping the vegetables while Lucas prepares the sauce and heats the wok. A companionable silence settles between them. It is punctuated by the thunk of the knife, the sizzling of the stove. Once she's done patting the vegetables dry, she passes them to Lucas and watches over his shoulder as he cooks. Soon the aroma has spread through the house, and Dawn finds herself acutely reminded of how hungry she actually is.

"I think we made too much," Lucas says once he's finished portioning out the vegetables onto their plates.

"We can always save the rest for later."

Lucas wrinkles his nose. "Cold stir fry?"

"Food is food." She takes the wok from Lucas and nudges the leftovers onto another plate with a spoon. "You'll never know when it'll come in handy.

He seems to give in, taking their plates with him to the breakfast nook. Once she's managed to fit the plate in the refrigerator, she follows him.

Dawn spears lettuce and broccoli, reveling in their rich taste on her tongue. It's been awhile since she's had food quite this rich, and her stomach lurches a bit in protest. She eats all the same.

"How close are you to finishing your doctorate?" Dawn says after she swallows another morsel.

Color rises to scroll along Lucas's cheekbones. He blots at his mouth with a paper napkin—an attempt to hide it, no doubt—before responding, "Oh, that's still a long way off." He taps his fork against the plate, his eyes on the food. "Two years or so."

She tries to feel excited for him, and finds that she's succeeded, the feeling bubbling up from underneath the dread that has settled tightly in her throat. "You'll be there before you know it."

"So Professor Rowan tells me." He pushes at his food, looking glum. "I suppose it just feels a bit surreal, you know?" She nods, and he goes on, "You're the Champion, I'm on the doctoral track..." He pauses and chuckles. "I even have my own apartment now."

"You do?" says Dawn, surprised.

Lucas nods. "In Jubilife City. It's not particularly nice or anything... but I'm a little fond of it, I guess?"

She thinks of her room at the League and frowns. "I can imagine."

"I can't make it to the lab in under five minutes anymore, of course. But the city—it's nice. I've collected a drawerful of takeout menus and everything."

She raises an eyebrow incredulously at that. "Takeout? You?"

"Barry brings them over whenever he's in the neighbor..." He trails off, his eyes fixed on her face. "I didn't mean to—"

"It's okay," Dawn says tightly. "I told you I wasn't angry with him."

Lucas keeps his eyes on her a moment longer before looking down at his plate, and Dawn, whose throat is so tight with dread that she can barely speak, closes her eyes and clears her throat, remembering.

"When Professor Rowan met with us at the Canalave City Library, he... asked me to follow Barry to Lake Acuity, remember?" She waits for his nod before continuing. "Barry... he ran ahead, and I knew that I would have to leave immediately if I was going to catch up to him. But I also knew..." She wets her lips. "I also knew that I wasn't strong enough to stop Team Galactic. Not its commanders, but especially not..." His face flashes across her mind's eye, and she feels her body go tense.

"Cyrus," Lucas finishes for her.

She nods. "Yes. Cyrus."

He waits, and she obliges.

"I knew that," she repeats, "but I also knew that Barry wasn't strong enough to hold his own against them. I knew that you couldn't either." She watches his fingers press into the table. "But I made a choice, and I went to Iron Island to train instead of chasing after Barry. By... by the time I was on my way to Lake Acuity, Barry was nearly there... and Team Galactic had blown it up."

The memories return to her unbidden: the deafening explosion in the distance, the way the pokémon rushed away from the smoke that plumed into the sky in flocks and stampedes. The magikarp that flopped uselessly against the lakebed, suffocating in the air. Barry's voice coming from somewhere further away. How she'd scrambled to reach him, Torterra and Luxray taking out the teams of each and every grunt that threw themselves in their path. She rushed, ran as fast as she could, but by the time she reached him...

She realizes, belatedly, that Lucas is speaking to her.

"—never begrudged you that, Dawn."

"What?" she says.

"Barry never begrudged you that," he says. "Neither did I. I thought you knew that when we helped you on Mt. Coronet."

"I'm the one who holds the grudge," she tells him.

"But you did the right thing."

"I know," she insists. "I know that, but... that _place_...!" It's suddenly hard for her to breathe. "It twists everything."

"The Distortion World," Lucas says, and Dawn inclines her head in acknowledgement. "I... I knew we should have followed you in." Something angry has insinuated itself into Lucas's voice. "I knew it was dangerous to let you go alone—"

"No," she croaks. "I'm glad you didn't. I... wouldn't wish that place on anyone. Not even him."

In the end, no one would know what it was like besides the three of them. The reflections of themselves became more and more distorted—increasingly _vicious_—with each step they took toward the epicenter. Time and space held no sway there. In truth, she could have been wandering through the cold darkness for days, perhaps even weeks.

But Lucas puts his hand over hers, and her fingers squeeze his, greedy for the contact. She tells him about her sleeplessness, the nightmares where he and Barry are lost to her among the darkness, how she fears the distortions had burrowed their way into her mind and changed her, incontrovertibly. The way darkness makes her heart beat too quick and her breathing catch in her chest. He won't be able to understand perfectly, it's true, but the way he confesses into nightmares of his own—ones where she disappears into the gaping maw of unraveled space-time and is lost to _him_—buoys her.

And there it is. The truth, out in the air. She doesn't feel particularly relieved. Only a terrible exhaustion encroaching quickly. Building behind her eyes as a terrible pressure and ache, twisting her lips. She gasps for breath.

His fingers are still there. "It's alright," he reassures her. "It's okay."

"I..." Dawn begins, and bursts into tears over her plate.

— . . . —

They don't pick up the plates. He only stacks them in the middle of the small table with his free hand.

Lucas holds her hand tightly as he leads her through the villa and flicks each light switch off. He skips the one in the hall, and Dawn hums in gratitude as they move toward the bedroom. Settling onto the mattress without bothering to change into her pajamas, Dawn pulls at his fingers, says, "Stay here. Please."

He seems to hesitate for a moment, but he eventually acquiesces, climbing onto the bed and settling beside in her. His fingers stay interwoven with hers and, tentatively, he draws her close, lets her tuck her damp, reddened face into his chest so that she can smell nothing but him.

Exhausted, she closes her swollen eyes.

— . . . —

She wakes without having dreamt at all.

It is dark in the room, only pale moonlight streaming in through the window. Beside her, Lucas sleeps, his breathing deep and even. There is a familiar silhouette hovering in the doorway, scrawny and tall.

Barry's eyes look uncharacteristically hesitant by the light of the moonlight, so Dawn reaches for him, her arm stretching out until he moves, slowly, to take her fingers between his.

_I'm sorry_, she mouths.

After another long moment, he settles on her other side, like when he slept over at her house as a child. The bed groans protestingly under their combined weight, but it holds them.

There were many things that could only be said in the morning, but until then, she has her best friends to keep her warm.

With Lucas on one side and Barry on the other, Dawn falls into another, dreamless sleep.


End file.
